EICR report - Ze is too high

[Itsallsoboring]

hello, any electricians?

i'm buying a house, so had an EICR done.
my electrician told me to inform the seller that the Ze is too high, it's an earthing issue, they need to call their network provider who will send out an engineer.

does anyone know what any of this means?
i also paid for the report, so i don't really care to tell the seller something in case the purchase falls through.

just some advice about the above, thanks

anyone?

Either tell the seller so they can get it fixed before you buy the house, or find out how much it will cost to fix so what you can either ask for a reduction on the house price or make sure you can pay to fix it once you have bought the house.

thanks.

it's seems like something the Network will deal with and pay for.

I'm not sure tbh. I am hoping to understand the role of the DNO and whatever this Ze issue is, and what they'll do about it.

I've never come across it before

From my own dealings with a DNO they will only respond to the property owner. If something needs to be fixed (no idea what a Ze is) the current owner needs to get them to fix it. Or, presumably, you wait until you’re the owner and you ask them.

If it’s not going to cost you anything I can’t see why you wouldn’t tell the seller. Even if the sale falls through you haven’t lost anything.

yeh, thanks both. I think I'll just let the seller know.

But I still just don't understand if there will be major works on the house now or something for fixing this high Ze issue. I'm bit worried about the impact and safety.

@NewFriendlyLadybird just wondering how responsive DNO were for you?

@Itsallsoboring very responsive, as a matter of fact. And I’ve looked up what a high ZE means — it’s not properly earthed. The DNO will respond urgently.

We had this when we bought our house as FTBs in 2018. The seller offered to sort it for us. What they in fact arranged was run a box out to the garden, which is apparently an alternative way of earthing, but he hadnt had it done properly, we had our electrician retest and the Ze was still too high, it wasnt buried deep enough and caused a massive row. We were arguing about it on the day of exchange but we really wanted the house and obviously the market in 2018 was a lot faster moving than now, so we agreed to proceed. When we moved in, we called the network, they needed access to us and our neighbour (who also weren't properly earthed), they did something in the wall near the consumer unit and it took maybe half a day? All completely free. We were so cross at our seller messing us about at the time but 6 years on, your thread is literally the first time I've thought about all that since!

@NewFriendlyLadybird @Sunnyshoeshine

thanks so much for helping with this. I've been a bit anxious about it because I thought there was a possibility it would take weeks to fix or something crazy.

@Sunnyshoeshine it sucks that your sellers did that and absolutely unsafe it sounds. Did the DNO provide you with paperwork after they did the work?

I intend to tell the seller i want to see the paperwork.

I honestly can't remember if they gave us any paperwork as DH organised it all. Im sorry. But no harm in asking!

How old is the house?

The "e" means external, I.e. not inside your house.

Very often the network owner will provide an earth, but if it is an old or rural house it might have an earth spike in the ground, which is the homeowners responsibility.

Here's a very vague link
www.ukpowernetworks.co.uk/safety-equipment/equipment-and-cables/earthing/report-an-earthing-issue

It sounds like some kind of electrical survey was done, the electrician, if local, is likely to know what the cause seems to be and how it can be rectified. I'm thinking that all the houses in the street or village might be similar.